A "mini" DVD (around 700MB-1GB)

[crackpot_religion]

I bought several instructional swimming DVDs that I want to carry around on my laptop. They all take lots of space so I'd like to reduce it to around 700MB or even less. Quality is not important, I still have the original discs and the raw backup on my desktop PC.

Is there a tool to do this with acceptable result, say by encoding the video streams into MPEG-4, or by reducing the resolution? All tools I've seen (DVD Rebuilder, DVD Shrink) encode to MPEG-2 and target to DVD-+R sizes.

I could encode to a single .AVI file, but these DVDs have many menu items to jump to various lessons that I want to keep.

[The Geek]

A miniDVD is DVD contents on a regular CD. You could do that, but since quality isn't too much of a concern, and you want them to be on the laptop, I'd use codecs like DivX or XVid, which allow you a very high compression. I'd reduce the resolution as well.

You can't use the DVD tools, because DVD only allows MPEG-1 and -2, not MPEG-4. To encode in DivX you need another tools, and you'll get an AVI file as the result, which you can play back on the laptop.

Dunno about the navigation part, but you could encode each lesson separately, instead of encoding one big avi.

The Geek

[crackpot_religion]

Dunno about the navigation part, but you could encode each lesson separately, instead of encoding one big avi.

Yeah, this is what I want to avoid :D . Basically I'd like a one-click tool that produces the same DVD content but smaller/lower-res and about 3-4x smaller (around or slightly under 1GB).

[PiXuS]

Originally posted by crackpot_religion
Yeah, this is what I want to avoid :D . Basically I'd like a one-click tool that produces the same DVD content but smaller/lower-res and about 3-4x smaller (around or slightly under 1GB).

Hmmm... I don't believe such a tool exists. Even the commercial Nero Recode won't let you that. For example, Nero Recode (just like DVD Shrink on which it is based) will let you shrink the size of the content of your DVD while preserving the menus, the extras and all that crap. But there is also an option to reencode everything in their proprietary MPEG-4 codec. Though, if you choose to use that codec, you cannot preserve the menus and the extras in their original structure anymore.

Too bad. I too would like such a tool. I think you CAN do it, but manually and with a lot of time.

[killingspree]

menu functionality etc etc is all planned for the matroska video container, but since it is far from being finished - i wouldn't wait for it now... basically, i'd say if you want all the dvd functionality, go for a dvd to dvd backup, probably keeping the iso on the hard disk... the other possibility is, as someone mentioned before, just reencoding each episode seperately, OR encoding the whole thing manually and creating a seperate chapter file (which only work with selected players though) to be able to jump to the part of the video automatically...

bsplayer is one of the players that supports such chapter files...

kr
steVe

[keithmac]

I THINK I`ve seen a .mov file with a chapter menu at the front? could be wrong though..

[SeeMoreDigital]

With Recode2 you can set your own "text numbered" chapter points!

However, you could opt for "good 'ol" VCD with it's 352x240/288 resolution.

With the right encoding application you can create chapter/menu points with images and everything....


Cheers